ves.

Tam Donaldson and Robert compared notes after the meeting was over in
the following conversation:

"What do you think o' it, Tam?"

"Christ! but it was great," was the reply.

"What aboot the three wives noo, Tam?"

"Oh, for ony sake, dinna rub it in, Rob. I feel that small that I could
hide myself in the hole of my back tooth. Man, do you ken, I jist felt
as if we were a' back in the Bible times again, wi' auld Isaiah
thundering oot his charges and tellin' the oppressors o' the people what
he thought of them. The white heid o' Hardie maun hae been gey like
Isaiah's. Or sometimes it was like John the Baptist, comin' to tell us
o' the new world that was ready to dawn for the folk! Man, it was
hellish guid, and frae this day I'm a Socialist. I've always been
fightin' the oppressors o' the workers, an' only wish I had a tongue
like Hardie, so that I could gang roon' the hale country tellin' folk
the rale God's truth aboot things. Guid God! Rob, it was better than
goin' to the kirk!"

"Ay, it was gran', Tam. I'm goin' to read up this Socialism; for it
seems to me to be worth it."

"So will I. I hae got twa or three bits o' books that I bought, an' I'll
swallow them as quick as I can. Lod! It seems as if a new world had
opened up a' thegether the night. I'm that dam'd happy, I could rin
roon' an' tell everybody aboot it! But I suppose we maun gang awa' hame
to bed; for we'll hae to gang to oor work the morn, though it's dam'd
cauld comfort to think o' gaun oot to the pit, when we could hae better
conditions to work in if only folk had the sense to do right."

Thus they parted, full of the subject which had stirred them so much
that night.

Robert went home, full of vision of an emancipated world, his whole
heart kindled and aglow with the desire to be a spokesman like Hardie on
behalf of the workers, and thoroughly determined to devote the rest of
his life to it.

"There's nae word o' Mysie yet," said Nellie, when he came in, and her
words seemed to shock him with their unexpectedness.

"Is there no'?" he replied, trying hard to bring his mind back to the
realities. "What kind o' word did Jenny get frae the polis?"

"Oh, they ken naething aboot her," said Nellie. "A' that is kenned is
jist what we heard already. The polis hae been searchin' noo for a
fortnight an' nae trace o' her can be got. Mr. Rundell has pit it in the
papers; but I hae my doots aboot ever seeing her again. Mysie wasna' the
lassie th